home owners: Austin #8 in Forbes Ranking for best
- 04/01/09 02:40 PM
The March 25, 2009 issue of Forbes Magazine declared Austin Texas as the top #8 Ranking for Best Places for Business and Career. thank you Forbes. We who live here know of the excellence we have around us, its nice to be able to share that with all you outsiders.
Low unemployment (4.2% in 2008) Income Growth, Job Growth(3.5%) and Projected Job Growth(2.3%) were some of the measured catagories. Along with a median Home Price of $188,300 Austin is definitely a place to be.
In February we did see a rise in our unemployment rate but I would guess not more (8 comments)

home owners: NO one will work with us because we don't have alot of $$money$$ to spend and we aren't looking for an expensive place.
- 02/04/09 07:33 AM
I had an interesting conversation with a new customer yesterday. First, let me acknowledge that the lead came in thru my ACTIVE RAIN comment email... so Thanks again, Active Rain. (even though I wasn't in my jammies at that time, I could have been because the web was still working for me).
So in this conversation, the Lady said, "we were looking at some other places with another REALTOR", my brain said STOP. I asked," are you working with another Realtor now?" She said, "No, no one wants to give us the time of day because we are not looking for a very (18 comments)

Thanks to the new federal law extension that allows eligible borrowers with adjusted gross incomes up to $100,000 to deduct 100% of their 2007-2010 borrower-paid MI premiums on their federal tax returns*.
The law is effective for transactions closed in 2007-2010. MI premiums paid in those years may qualify for tax deductibility on borrowers' federal tax returns as follows:
Borrowers with adjusted gross incomes (13 comments)

home owners: Onion Creek Floodplain Buyout UPDATE Yarrabee Bend
- 12/29/08 06:28 PM
To all in the Yarrabee Bend, Onion Creek Floodplain Buyout area... and open letter to all.
EVERYONE ... this is an Update on the Onion Creek Floodplain Buyout Program ... many of you received a letter recently with some details. A meeting is scheduled for some neighbors next week for a question and answer program.
HDR Engineering will spearhead the community meetings for owners and residents. As previously discussed in other postings, this is NOT a voluntary buyout. I understand the company is trying to make your transistion as smooth as possible and provide you with Realtors to answer your questions.
So, (1 comments)

home owners: Stop Identity Theft Day Saturday APRIL 19, 2008 Austin Texas
- 03/30/08 10:33 AM
Stop Identity Theft
The City of Austin Texas is sponsoring a STOP IDENTITY THEFT day, Saturday APRIL 19,2008 from 7:30am-2:30pm. This is a great way to get rid of all that abundance of paperwork we all amass. You may bring up to 5 file boxes of paper records for shredding. Oh, did I say it is FREE?
Mobile shredding trucks from AUSTIN SHRED, a Balcones Resource Company, CenTex Shred and Iron Mountain will be on-site to shred the material.
Heres the scoop.
April 19,2008, Saturday 7:30Am-2:30PM
AUSTIN HIGH PARKING LOT 1715 W Cesar Chavez Austin Texas
Restrictions are.. NO WET MATERIAL, (8 comments)

home owners: Open House near APPLIED MATERIALS, DELL and SAMSUNG, Austin Texas
- 03/15/08 08:42 AM
Want to save on gas and live near work? Bike to work? Walk to work? walk to elementary school? 11108 Seay St, Austin, Tx 78754OPEN HOUSE TODAY 3/15/2008 1-4PM Here is the perfect FAMILY HOME, featuring 6 bedrooms, (master suite downstairs and its enormous) 5 Bedrooms up with large closets, ceiling fans, 3.5 baths, family-living, formal dining, gameroom upstairs, and large country kitchen. Custom hardwood floor in dining, new tile floors in entry, kitchen, and breakfast area. Privacy fenced backyard... neutral colors throughout.PRICED AT $235,900.Walk to work at APPLIED MATERIALS, short commute to SAMSUNG and DELL... minutes to the 130 TollRoad, ez (7 comments)

home owners: Open House near APPLIED MATERIALS, DELL and SAMSUNG, Austin Texas
- 03/15/08 08:41 AM
Want to save on gas and live near work? Bike to work? Walk to work? walk to elementary school? 11108 Seay St, Austin, Tx 78754OPEN HOUSE TODAY 3/15/2008 1-4PM Here is the perfect FAMILY HOME, featuring 6 bedrooms, (master suite downstairs and its enormous) 5 Bedrooms up with large closets, ceiling fans, 3.5 baths, family-living, formal dining, gameroom upstairs, and large country kitchen. Custom hardwood floor in dining, new tile floors in entry, kitchen, and breakfast area. Privacy fenced backyard... neutral colors throughout.PRICED AT $235,900.Walk to work at APPLIED MATERIALS, short commute to SAMSUNG and DELL... minutes to the 130 TollRoad, ez (2 comments)

home owners: Austin Texas #1 in Movie Making Magazine
- 03/13/08 08:28 AM
Austin Texas has been announced this morning as the #1 city for movie making location by Magazine Movie Making in its 8th Annual list.Austin is movie-maker friendly since the late Ann Richards enticed Hollywood to try Austin first. With property a great value and scenery worth looking at and a population of talented folks plus the condusive weather to outdoor shooting its no wonder Austin is #1!!!Moving up from #3 position of last year, being beaten out by #1 New York City and #2 Los Angeles, this year we are #1!! Hooray for the hometeam!! If you have real estate needs in the Austin (11 comments)

home owners: Phone Opportunity as a source of Leads
- 03/13/08 08:12 AM
While reading Where Do All The Leads Go? by David Slavin of Katy Texas this morning it brought to my mind about where do my leads come from and I realized many come from floor duty or what we call Phone Opportunity.And an Opportunity it is.. back when I was in retail sales we as salepersons were taught, "someone enters our store to purchase something" its our job to find out what they want to purchase. That is the same with most calls that come into a real estate office. Someone wants to buy, sell or lease a home. Simple right? (2 comments)

home owners: Update on Austin Flood Zone Buyout- Onion Creek Area
- 02/27/08 04:43 PM
The Onion Creek City of Austin- FEMA buyout is coming to an end. $6 million dollars had been funded to buyout homes in the Yarrabee Bend area of South Austin. Home owners were offered fair market appraisal cost and given a specific time to accept or decline the offer. Most of the homeowners did accept the offer and have relocated to other parts of Austin.The second phase of the Onion Creek - Yarrabee Bend area buyout will be taken over by the US ARMY CORP OF ENGINEERS in June 2008 and will begin in October 2008 and expect to end June 2013. (20 comments)

home owners: market Activity Report in South Austin Texas for jan 2007 and jan 2008 comparable.
- 02/27/08 03:59 PM
Market Activity Report in South Austin Texas for the month of Jan 2007 and Jan 2008We have some cool areas in South Austin that are heavy residential areas, 10N, 10S, and SWW being the most popular in what keeps Austin weird. The areas are family oriented from all types and walks of life. Artist community is heavy in area 10N and multi cultural influences 10S while SWW is has a heavy influence of tech and professional families. Lots of parks and local flavor in all these areas.Here are a few stats for those folks who like to compare data .. This (0 comments)

home owners: Its a Beautiful Morning
- 02/06/08 07:56 AM
The sun is shining and its a cold crisp morning here in Central Texas, about 40 degrees this morning, blue skies, cloudless day and the high will be near 70 today. Nothing to complain about at all.
The past few days have been trying for me, flu, grandones sick too, a cranky client, and whine whine whine for days... and the Pats lost the superbowl. Well .. .folks.. today is a new day and in celebration of today here is my song ... I wish you all such a glorious day to enjoy.
If you would like to begin (15 comments)

home owners: The Village of Bear Creek Oaks Austin Tx
- 01/25/08 09:38 AM
Today I realized what a great community I am priviledged to live in.. The Village of Bear Creek Oaks is just outside of Austin Texas. This area is rural in feel and community spirit. All of the homes here are on at least 1 acre and some up to 22 acres.
We are horse friendly, so I can look out my backdoor and see the animals grazing or playing in their pasture. Its wonderful to have the ponies at home where we can enjoy them to the fullest.
In Nov 1997 this community Incoporated to keep their area rural and keep control (3 comments)

home owners: Raising awareness of Active Rain
- 01/21/08 11:03 AM
Today I see 66,700 Members of active rain.. I know many many members of the public view our blogs and like our site.. I would like to challenge every member to help raise the Public Awareness of ActiveRain. We can all help get the word out to the public and it will raise every members online presence.The thoughts of putting AR membership on my business cards came to me.. the AR logo on my Open House signs, flyers and all the eflyers and brochures .. I think it would benefit all members and open the public eyes to this network of (16 comments)

home owners: does your computer give you the warm and fuzzys?
- 01/21/08 10:39 AM
Tech Monday is a feature in our local The Austin American Statesman, it is a weekly featured section about the TECH ideas, innovation and other news you can use for our large Techno Field. Austin has become Silicon Hills, not quite riveling but with a strong presence to Silicon Valley in California.
Todays Tech Monday feature was about your laptop and pc new features.. the trend in the computer industry is now to make users feel good about their computers. The feeling when you get into a nice new car feeling, without the new car smell. Although that maybe just around (11 comments)

home owners: IS Major Applewhite coming back to the HORNS at UT?
- 01/16/08 08:31 AM
This week Major Applewhite has been interviewing with the University of Texas Longhorns for a coaching position. The Major is well remembered as a great quarterback with an awesome attitude toward wins and losses while he lead the Horns to many victories.
The Austin American-Statesman, Jan 16, 2008 edition stated the formal job proposal can't be finalized until Thursday, Jan 17, due to the job posting rules, requiring it will be for 5 days, thursday is the earliest a formal job announcement can be made.. A local radio station has unofficially announced the job has been given to Major Applewhite .. no details (2 comments)

home owners: Austin Texas Time to look for your MOVE UP home?
- 01/16/08 08:10 AM
Is the bond market good for home interest loans? This week Fannie Mae has rates at 5.5%... it seems the rates are the lowest in quite a while. IF you are a buyer looking for good news in the home ownership market this is definitely a time to get serious about buying that new home.Chart: Fannie Mae 5.5% Mortgage Bond (Friday Jan 11, 2008) Have you been thinking about MOVING UP? To a larger home? or maybe downsizing? Today would be a good day to start that journey to a new home. WIth interest rates this low one can't lose ... (0 comments)

home owners: Austin Texas Market Stats for 2007 by Price
- 01/16/08 07:48 AM
This is the report issued this week .. January 14, 2008. Austin Texas remains a strong market even though it has softened in the latter part of 2007 .. while other parts of the country were in a major slow-down the Austin Texas market just slowed to a healthy speed.It seems many buyers are aware this is a strong healthy growth market and many are taking advantage of good interest rates right now. Since the middle of Dec 2007 we seem to be warming up here in the marketplace, usually the spring is the warming period but spring has come early (0 comments)

home owners: Forbes Magazine rates Austin Texas as a TOP CITY for jobs.
- 01/16/08 07:32 AM
In the January 11, 2008 edition of Forbes Magazine an article by Matthew Kirdahy cited Austin Texas as #3 in Top Ten Cities for Jobs. The ratings were based on 5 data points, The states unemployment rate, job growth, income growth, median household income and the cost of living for full-year (2006). The list did not consider specifics like job composition or job stability.If you would like to read the whole article here is a link.. http://finance.yahoo.com/career-work/article/104184/Best-Cities-for-Jobs-in- Do you have Real Estate needs in Austin Texas, Dripping Springs, Buda or Kyle? I can help you find what you would love..Are (5 comments)

home owners: Austin Texas experiencing growth in a down market.
- 01/13/08 03:41 PM
Todays headline in the AUSTIN AMERICAN-STATESMEN proclaimed more good news for Austin TEXAS, continued growth, home sales, office vacancies low and rents climbing plus startup venture capitol still available.While many parts of the nation are experiencing slower growth rates, glimpses of recession and a slow housing market the Austin area is chugging right along. The Austin American-Statesman points out that Austin will probably slow down some in 2008, with the rest of the national slowdown but the overall predictions are for steady growth with the strong jobs economy in a growing Technology based economy. One such growth factor was SamSung expanding and (2 comments)

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